


Eavesdropping

by flaggermousse



Series: Bad Memories from the First War [4]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Betrayal, First War with Voldemort, Gen, Implied/Referenced Fenrir Greyback/Remus Lupin, Implied/Referenced Murder, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Implied/Referenced Sirius Black/Remus Lupin - Freeform, POV Peter Pettigrew, here it is only referenced through gloating, the Fenrir/Remus is past rape/non-con that happened in a previous work in this series
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-27
Updated: 2020-09-27
Packaged: 2021-03-08 02:07:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,457
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26667952
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flaggermousse/pseuds/flaggermousse
Summary: The light from the fireplace illuminated two men in the living room. Peter had seen posters of both of them, with warnings about not approaching. Antonin Dolohov sat in an armchair while Fenrir Greyback paced around the room.“So when’s this new informant coming?”Peter’s own heartbeat drummed in his ears. They were talking abouthim. Dolohov stretched in the chair. “Soon, I hope. Don’t want to be stuck here all night.”Greyback grinned. “Perhaps he’s bringing the entire Order here as we speak.”Dolohov played with his wand. In the light from the fireplace, his eyes seemed to glitter. “That could be interesting too. But with any luck he will come. He could give us information on the Order’s hideouts. Would make it easier to pick them off.”
Series: Bad Memories from the First War [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1907800
Comments: 6
Kudos: 69





	Eavesdropping

**Author's Note:**

> The three previous fics together [Assault](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24046072), [Aftermath](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26292643) and [Taunts](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26604859) is a complete story, but I ended up making this little side-thing as well, and figured I’d post it in the same series as the rest.

The house stood by itself on the outskirts of the village. Hidden by the high grass, a tiny rat snuck towards it. Peter hoped this was the right place. He had only seen the address once, before the note was destroyed, and he could not afford to make mistakes. He had to stay alive.

He was half expecting there to be a Dark Mark over the house, but of course that would be absurd. They couldn’t advertise where they were. Now, as so many times before, he was grateful for his disguise. No one looked twice at a tiny rat, so he could search the house to make sure it was like he had been promised. They had said he could become one of them. He just needed to give them a little bit of information.

By the door, Peter hesitated. It wasn’t too late to turn back.

He could return home, go to sleep, and perhaps in the morning visit Godric’s Hollow. Lily was tired now, nearing her due date, but she was always happy to sit down and have tea with a guest. James could talk his ear off about the baby room he was working on. Or he could take a trip to London and see how Remus and Sirius were doing. Remus had seemed tired lately; perhaps the latest moons had been bad. Peter could bring something to drink; maybe the three of them could watch a movie or something.

He could go back to his friends. To the losing side. Peter wasn’t stupid. He could see the way things were going. All around them, people were dying. His friends would go down fighting, but _Peter_ didn’t want to die at all.

One of the windows was slightly ajar, and the tiny rat managed to squeeze in. No alarms went off as he tiptoed over a broken table and onto the floor. The corridor was dark, but the room behind the open door at the end was illuminated. Quietly, Peter snuck towards it, keeping close to the wall. The light from living room fell on the corridor floor and revealed a bloody trail, as if a body had been dragged out of the house. It had mostly dried up now, but still felt somewhat sticky underneath Peter’s paws. He could hear someone laughing as he carefully snuck through the door.

“-tried to stop me! A muggle! His wife squealed like a mouse when he dropped dead in front of her.”

The light from the fireplace illuminated two men in the living room. Peter had seen posters of both of them, with warnings about not approaching. Antonin Dolohov sat in an armchair as he recounted what he did to the previous inhabitants of the house.

“By the time I’d killed the woman, the kid had locked herself in the kitchen. Stupid brat. As if muggle-locks are any good against spells.”

The other man laughed. Peter recognized him as well; this was Fenrir Greyback, the werewolf. Why were there two people here? Was it a trap? When he had been told the address he should go to, he hadn’t been certain what to expect. He was an Order-member; he could be useful to them … surely they wouldn’t waste that chance?

“The girl threw a knife at me when I opened the door. I paid her back for that.”

Peter dared to take his eyes of the men for a moment and peered in through the open kitchen door. Blood had splattered up on the walls. So this was where the bloody trail had started. Slowly Peter turned away, and started sneaking towards the dinner table. He hid in the shadows of the chairs and table cloth. Those people had been muggles. _He_ was a wizard, _he_ was one of them, _he_ could be useful-

“So when’s this new informant coming?”

Peter’s own heartbeat drummed in his ears; they were talking about _him_. Dolohov stretched in the chair. “Soon, I hope. Don’t want to be stuck here all night.”

“Maybe he got cold feet.”

“I’ll just have to wait and see.”

Greyback grinned. “Perhaps he’s bringing the entire Order here as we speak.”

Dolohov played with his wand. In the light from the fireplace, his eyes seemed to glitter. “That could be interesting too. But with any luck he will come. He could give us information on the Order’s hideouts. Would make it easier to pick them off.”

One of the walls had several pictures of Order-members. It seemed like someone had passed the time by using them as targets for darts; there was barely anything left of Dumbledore’s face. Peter spotted several photos from James and Lily’s wedding. Some of their guests were dead now, he knew, perhaps the photos came from their homes. Greyback picked down a photo of Remus fixing Sirius’ tie late in the evening. 

“So we’re killing all of them? Including Remus Lupin?” Greyback brushed away some soot from the damaged corner of the photo. “Too bad. He’s a pretty little thing.”

Dolohov shrugged. “Well, if that’s your taste.”

“Ah, but this photo doesn’t do him justice. It’s when he’s struggling and screaming underneath you that you see how beautiful he truly is.”

Peter froze. The hairs stood up on the back of his neck.

“Oh, _really?_ ” Dolohov’s tone sounded eerily like one of the boys in the common room, asking their mate for details on how far he’d gone with his girlfriend. It was disturbingly misplaced in this situation.

“Yes. I broke his wrist but he kept fighting. Tried to claw my eyes out. I fucked him till he bled and then I had him again. The _sounds_ he made.” Greyback smiled, as if he was reliving a particularly pleasant memory. “Best fuck I’ve had. I threw that in Black’s face the next time our paths crossed.”

Dolohov laughed. “A wonder he didn’t kill you, then.”

“Not for lack of trying.”

Greyback was right; Sirius _would_ have tried to kill him. If _Sirius_ had been in this room, hearing this, he would have sent a dozen curses by now. But he wasn’t Sirius, he was just Peter. So he hid in the shadows and tiptoed towards the door. The last thing he heard before slipping out the window, was Greyback musing: “When we win, perhaps the Dark Lord will let me keep Remus.”

Outside, a nightly breeze was blowing. Peter sucked in the free air; he felt nauseous. The mental images Greyback’s comments had conjured up did nothing to calm his already frayed nerves. Something _had_ been slightly off with Remus lately. Looking back on it now, there had been fewer smiles, fewer laughs. Sirius had been more hesitant around him, as if he needed to ask permission before he touched him, instead of just pulling him into a kiss the way he usually did. Respecting his boundaries instead of just taking what he wanted.

Why did this bother him? He knew what Death Eaters were capable of. It had been less than a week since they killed Theodore Ward, and judging by his remains, it hadn’t been a quick death. It wasn’t even murder Greyback had bragged about. Was it because Peter _knew_ Remus? Was that it?

As far as Peter knew, none of his friends has forced themselves on anyone. The Ministry was authorizing using Unforgivable Curses, but he had rarely seen anyone in the Order actually using them. Some even tried to bring people in alive if it was possible; they wouldn’t sink as low as the enemy.

The Death Eaters killed whoever they wanted; they destroyed whole families without remorse. Torture was amusing to these people. _This_ was who he was throwing in his lot with. They didn’t have scruples, they didn’t care what lines they crossed.

Perhaps that was why they were winning.

Hearing steps, Peter hid before the door creaked open. Greyback walked out into the yard before disapparating. Dolohov was alone in there now. Waiting for the new informant. For Peter.

He sat quietly in the grass, thinking. He thought about Remus helping him with his homework, explaining it so he understood what professor Flitwick had meant. Sirius hexing those Slytherin boys that had beat him up, and getting detention for it. James leading the way through the Forbidden Forest the very first night they left the Shrieking Shack. Lily throwing her wedding bouquet to him, so he had an excuse to strike up a conversation with Polly Nettles. The tiny crib they had just bought when he last visited them.

They were all going to die.

…

They couldn’t expect him to die _with_ them.

Peter transformed back into a human, walked up to the door of the house and knocked three times.

**Author's Note:**

> I thought I was done with this series, but then I started thinking.
> 
> Remus didn’t want anyone to know, and Sirius respected that. Moody found out, but no one heard about it from him. When Remus told Dumbledore he couldn’t go back to spying, he didn’t give many details, and it was clear he wasn’t doing well. Dumbledore let it go and didn’t ask any more questions, but he had some suspicions that things had gone very wrong.
> 
> Other than that, no one in the Order knew. Greyback, on the other hand, had no problem with anyone knowing what happened. As seen in the last part, he used it to make Sirius lose his cool, and among his fellow comrades, he could brag about it just as he and others did with the murders and torture they had committed.
> 
> I was already playing around with these scraps of a scene about Peter Pettigrew, and the two ideas just ended up melting together into this little thing, and I ended up adding it to this series.


End file.
